Goodyear’s energy-generating tire could charge your electric car

What if your car could be powered where the rubber meets the road? Range anxiety persists as a fear among electric car drivers, as heavy batteries with limited capacity remain slow to charge. Goodyearhas announced its concept for a heat-gathering, electricity-generating tire at the 2015 Geneva International Auto Show, and the tire could change all that by making a few changes to an oft-overlooked component.

Goodyear is admittedly a little vague on the details of the BH03 concept tire, but what they do tell us is this: the tire would capture the heat generated by the friction of the tire rolling along the road, as well as from the flexing of the tire under normal driving conditions. In addition to that, the tire itself—in the form of a layer of thermo-piezoelectric material—could capture light and heat when the vehicle is stationary, and transform that into more electricity.